Sarasota students excel at Florida History Fair

Students from Pine View School, Booker Middle School, Heron Creek Middle School and Sarasota Virtual Academy impressed judges at the Florida History Fair.

The event was May 6 at Tallahassee Community College with an awards ceremony the next day at the Tallahassee Automobile Museum.

In their documentaries, websites, exhibits and research papers, the students explored "Turning Points in History: People, Ideas, Events," the theme of National History Day this year.

Pine View student Oliver Gray placed second in the Senior Individual Documentary category for his documentary, "The Cuyahoga River: A Turning Point for the Environmentalist Movement."

The documentary also received an Outstanding County Award.

Pine View students Richard Ehlers and Thomas Kelly placed second in the Senior Group Documentary category for "Turning Point in History: The Dropping of the Atomic Bomb."

Gray, Ehlers and Kelly will be among the students representing Florida at the National History Day event, which will be from June 9 to 13 at the University of Maryland in College Park.

Grace Gerdes, Kaliyah Newell and Brionna Newell of Booker Middle School placed third in the Junior Group Performance category for "Brown v. Board of Education."

James Niffenegger of Pine View placed third in the Senior Individual Website category for "The Cuban Missile Crisis: A Turning Point for Diplomacy."

The students may compete at National History Day if first- and second-place winners in their categories are unable to attend.

Also placing in the Top 10 in their categories at the Florida History Fair were Ashley Marceus of Sarasota Virtual Academy for her Senior Historical Paper, "Brown v. Board of Education: Implementing a Dream," and Kasi Beauchamp, Yuliya Fateyeva and Jenna Gonzalez of Heron Creek Middle School for their Junior Group Exhibit, "Mary Wollstonecraft: A Turning Point for Women's Rights."

Approximately 56,000 students in sixth through 12th grades from 31 counties participated in the state event.

Sixty-three students from 15 counties will represent Florida at the National History Day competition.

Grant will help blood bank to check in its donors

Gulf Coast Community Foundation recently gave $26,000 to the Suncoast Communities Blood Bank to help buy a BIO-key TruDonor, an automated donor check-in identification system.

TruDonor helps to identify blood donors while protecting privacy, and provides a fast and reliable way for blood and platelet donors to register.

The technology eliminates potential errors, such as duplicate records and misidentification. The system converts the donor's fingerprint into a mathematical template for each individual.

The information is stored, allowing donors to simply scan their finger for all future donations.

The blood bank will fully implement the program this summer. For more information, call (866) 972-5663.